Heretofore, people with stained teeth from pathologic and non-pathologic reasons, have had to go to a dentist for the cosmetic lightening of the dentition. One method is known as power bleaching. It involves caustic solutions of hydrogen peroxide (35%) and phosphoric acid (35%) with heat and or light. This requires 4-12 visits to a dental office, where diligent protection of the gums and oral mucosa have to be done. This requires approximately 1-hour per visit, and a fee assessed accordingly. These caustic solutions produce rough enamel and not uncommonly, dental sensitivity.
More recently there has been the advent of matrix bleaching. This still involves going to a dentist for the fabrication of a matrix. It is a plastic tray that fits over the teeth, for the purpose of containing a peroxide gel with a hydrogen peroxide content of from about 1.5%-6%, or its equivalent. The patient has to have impressions made of the teeth, casts fabricated, and a plastic sheet melted and vacuum formed to the casts, which then has to be trimmed and fitted. The fitting when done properly generally involves selective grinding, (occlusal equilibration) on the now plastic matrix or tray in order for the anterior teeth to occlude simultaneously along with the posterior teeth against the tray. This is important as well as involved. If, when a person swallows, the posterior teeth occlude on this plastic matrix (tray) without the anterior teeth occluding, then the TMJ (temperomandibular joint) is tweeked, or twisted. This leads to a complete syndrome of problems--from headaches, neck aches, muscle spasms and chronic jaw joint pain to mental neurosis. This of course, takes time.
Patients can't seem to get their teeth too white! For this reason, they are wearing their trays much longer than the dentist ever intended. Those dentist who did not equilibrate (selectively grind) the tray (matrix) and did not expect the patient to wear their tray for so long, are creating potential problems later, as well as real problems currently. It is only at this time that we dentists are discovering these newly created problems and concerns. A solution is needed to this, due to the very devastating nature of a full blown TMJ syndrome; and to the potential seeding of that syndrome. Many dentist do not realize the insidious beginnings of the problems that they are treating in this new and burgeoning field of cosmetic bleaching. Perhaps one of the reasons why this invention hasn't been thought of before.
The only other method for whitening teeth, the swab-on method, can be tracked back to 1907. It involves swabbing hydrogen peroxide on the teeth. Reference is made to a book by Gardner D. Hiscox, Henleys Twentieth Century Formulas, Recipes and Processes, Norman Henley Pub. Co., N.Y. 1927 p. 705. This method has been brought back with great popularity and promoted on television and in pharmacies. It is not very effective, since the effectiveness of bleaching is determined by the contact time of the bleach on the teeth, according to research by the Clinical Research Associates in Provo, Utah. This is stated in the CRA Newsletter, Vol. 13, Issue 12--Dec. 1989, p. 1, Provo, Utah. There is also safety concerns of long term exposure of hydrogen peroxide, which is necessary with this method, due to its ineffectiveness.
Since my invention was recognized in the professional publication-- Dental Products Report, November 1989, several competitors have found it novel and worthy of infringement by manufacturing products very similar, in order to copy the process thereby accomplishing its objectives, and advantages.